you're like
by spiralbound
Summary: She's like honeydew, whispers, expectations, the feeling of waiting for someone at the corner stop, like all your words, all your dreams. And sometimes, she's a little more.


A/N: I realize I'm 1) a cheeseball and 2) a one- trick pony, so to spice things up (hurr, hurr) there's -surprise- no references!

& this one goes to A. (Pretty Little Liars style), the one who has been making me feel that _I'm like..._ :)

* * *

At 14 Rachel is beginning to understand the concept of the forbidden fruit. You want something very much, it tempts you, but you don't entirely know why you long for it as much as you do.

What she doesn't understand is why it had to be an apple. Bright, round, not squishy, healthy - actually good for you in all but Biblical ways. Well, unless you're Snow White.

To Rachel, Quinn is kind of like that. Except certainly not a fruit. She's more like candy, like lemon drops or dark chocolate. She's horribly good looking on the outside but her taste is rather bitter. A crazy craving.

The brunette doesn't understand it, not at all, why she follows Quinn up and down the stairs of McKinley, why she runs to keep walking with in stride with the cheerleader just to argue and bicker over boyfriends and classes for a moment longer.

* * *

To Quinn, Rachel is like an extra shadow. She means it in a very stalker way which is troublesome enough.

What's more troublesome is that Rachel knows when to shy off in the light of others, when to back down and let Quinn be. But still, ever still, the two are connected in some perplexing way. And even if Rachel Barbra Berry, tiny and annoying Jewish diva can be endlessly frustrating, it's also a good comfort to fall back on, the fact that she doesn't leave. Not even when all the slushies try to color her red, blue and velvet.

* * *

When the blonde gets pregnant, Rachel thinks that it's the first time she's been like a balloon physically. Expanding and ready to pop (no pun intende—oh, too late) and burst. Emotionally, mentally, Quinn has been that way for long. Expanding on other's people expectations, spreading herself out to meet all of them, and not one is her own aspiration. Catastrophe is inevitable.

* * *

Quinn thinks Rachel is a drifting cloud. Very bubbly and fluffy on the outside, all steam and no consistency inwards. The girl is driven to be famous, to be an artist and still all she appears to go is make cute eyes at awkwardly tall boy or ones with absurd hairstyles. Whatever, the blonde, huffs and puffs, there's winds, and clouds float away, and they change form. She hopes for Rachel, a rare moment of straightforward inner admittance of care, that whatever winds come her way, they take her to better places.

* * *

Rachel actually likes Quinn's pink hair. It's rather edgy, certainly a fine couture, although more street-based than haute. She doesn't like the change because Quinn is more broken and carrying much more sadness than ever before.

Rachel decides Quinn has a heart made of swan feathers. Tender, frail, exquisite and full of immense desperation.

* * *

When Quinn actually befriends Rachel, she thinks the brunette is like the sensation of tickling someone.

The feeling comes at once, childish joy, millions of small needle tips dancing across your body, begging for your laughter.

Quinn laughs a lot when Rachel is around.

* * *

Now that it's summer, and there's no Joe for Quinn and no Finn for Rachel, the two spend more and more time together. Rachel accompanies Quinn to therapy this one time and sees the long scar running down Quinn's spine like a waterfall.

But she doesn't think of Quinn as a waterfall, there's nothing of that strong and determined smile that reminds her of falling.

She thinks of a sunflower, bowing to the sun, and lifting with its light. She thinks of a strong stem and the purest of gold colors.

* * *

Quinn thinks of Rachel like honey. Sticky, because at this point there's no doubt the girl is here to stay, but also slow, not rushing, and sweet in a soft, not overbearing way.

* * *

Rachel thinks of Quinn as earthquakes. When they hold each other, always by accident, always when they have to share a small dorm bed, it's like trembling and re-aligning the Earth.

* * *

Quinn likes it when Rachel is like a pistachio. A little effort to crack her open but totally worth the snatch. They still oppose each other on opinions, music, clothes, politics, arts. They still fight over words and people. But in the end the, once out of the shell of all societal or other pressures, just their honest selves, it's great.

* * *

Rachel thinks of Quinn's first kiss as a hummingbird. It's so quick, her heart could fly out of her mouth. It happens when the Yale student is taking Rachel to the train stop, direction New York, New York, big dreams.

"Goodbye then, text me when you get home."

"I miss you already."

Then Quinn flies to her lips, pecks them and retreats a step back. "I miss you too."

* * *

Quinn thinks of Rachel's first kiss as an electric shock. The paddles of whichever fate-wielding deity are set to lightning storms within the girl's chest when she feels the light pressure of bright pink lips on her mouth.

"I think I'm going to miss this train," Rachel laughs and goes in for another, and another, and another.

She misses her train and her Monday lectures. It's not a total education waste, because she goes to one of Quinn's classes but then they both forego academic life for the rest of the day and enjoy each other.

* * *

Rachel thinks of Quinn is a cat. Sometimes a big cat, like a lion who protects her fiercely and uncompromisingly. Other times, she thinks of her as some adorable stray who looks at her with pleading eyes for adoration and who is she to deny the most loving thing she knows? At night, when they huddle together into a messy mix of limbs and Quinn whispers secrets, Rachel thinks of her girlfriend, no, now fiancée, like the soft pads underneath a kitty's paws. Those tender hands press into her back and teach her all the ways to be home in someone's embrace.

* * *

Quinn thinks of Rachel, naked in their big house, as a Renaissance statue of marble and eternal beauty. She wishes she could keep this moment, this image, this feeling forever or at least for as long as she can. Renaissance is about loving the person while the person is, and Quinn has a hunch she'll love Rachel when they're both stardust floating in space.

Rachel is looking at the streets, now wrapped in bed sheets that smell of love. There's nothing Quinn's seen that's looked more beautiful, more alive.

* * *

Rachel thinks of Quinn's first wrinkle as a river line and she sails down it with kisses and,

"We're going to grow old together."

"We already are," answers her wife, dignity, pride and joy lacing in her words. Feelings neither thought could exist when they were younger. But who could ever be content to grow old if not those who get to share it with someone who loves their early morning breath and their midnight nightmare sweat.

* * *

Sometimes Quinn's voice crackles like branches in fires. Rachel acts like a rabbit on speed in the mornings even when they're really old.

Quinn likens her love to dragons and fairies when they travel the world, the things of happy endings and magic delights are all in Rachel's skins and lively eyes.

Rachel thinks of Quinn as old books and favorite authors she knows by heart. She's memorized the way her sighs sound and the way she rolls thumbs up and down her palms when she's thinking. Rachel always wants to know more of Quinn.

They compare each other to anything and everything in their lives – they see each other in everything, or maybe just everything reminds them of one another, or maybe even they've reached the point where if they were only together, nothing else to be, they'd still have everything.

In the end, no words, objects, feelings, experiences really compare.

Rachel and Quinn are like love, like people, like absolutely nothing else in the world.


End file.
